


Genius

by Hierarchical



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, Dangan Ronpa: Kirigiri, Dangan Ronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Love, Mention of Deceased Mother, Poetic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-18 17:07:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13686036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hierarchical/pseuds/Hierarchical
Summary: A little Kyoko Kirigiri drabble I wrote about her life up until she receives the letter to get accepted into Hope's Peak Academy.





	Genius

Genius. 

It’s such a captivating word. A word that can paint a portrait of someone before the first encounter. A simple phrase that can be uttered to a child to refill their conviction. A word that describes someone who’s a master at their craft. Lyrical genius, literary genius, athletic genius, strategic genius—all special snowflakes; one of a kind. But there was no genius quite like her.

Kyoko Kirigiri. _She_ was a genius. If one disagreed with that they were avoiding reality. She was the one who found the truth. The one blessed with the gift to remove the wry trompe l'oeils that twisted the horrifying truth. A detective. A sleuth. A perceiver. A genius. That was who she was.

Her prowess showed itself from an early age, but it may as showed itself from the womb. Her last name alone created an image of excellence before even she was. Kirigiri—a long family of decorous detectives, investigators, and private eyes. This one was no different. 

Even though she was a special kind of genius, even from the conception her curriculum vitae was decided. She would be not doctor, not lawyer, nor earth healer, nor athlete, nor pilot take wings—she would be a detective.

Often in her earlier year, she’d talk to her grandfather about how she wished to wish to be numerous professions which had changed with age, but she would always be met with swift negation. It was a slap, a caution, a reminder of what she was—who she was, and how those thoughts would differentiate and alienate her from the regular Kirigiri. After all, she didn’t wish to become like her father—a disgrace to the Kirigiri name.

She was raised with neither mother nor father by her side—the former deceased and the latter absent—only her feeble grandfather who hammered his ideologies into her, which in turn fashioned the stoic detective she had become.

‘Detective work must come above all else.’ 

That was what she was told, and that was what Kyoko was forced to believe. Even if cherubs didn’t grasp concepts easily, or quickly, Kyoko Kirigiri was no normal child. She was a Kirigiri, and the youngest to begin in that line of work—an intuitive prodigy.

So, despite her wishes, despite her dreams, despite her questions, she worked on case after case with her mentor, from the time the sun kissed her face in the morning, giving her the warmth she needed to begin again until the glimmering moon sent her to bed in the acrimony of the frigid cold. But that was just her life. The life of a bonafide Kirigiri.

Her young age and prodigal status eventually earned her the title of ‘Junior Detective’. Mission after mission, case after case, the purple-haired detective continued to work, the natural human inclination of wanting to assist driving her. She was never one for camaraderie due to her naturally shy nature, but she had a deep passion for succor. She clung to that passion like the poor cling to hope, and she continued to work, doubling her efforts and slowly inheriting more and more shades of her grandfather—hatred for the man who made her included.

By the time the young sleuth had reached double digits, something within her changed. Perhaps it was simply the maturity that came with age. Perhaps beginning to slave away on homicide cases had made her grow bitter after having to view corpse after corpse—the horrifying expressions of the lifeless bodies engraving themselves in her mind, haunting her in her dreams. Or maybe, just maybe, it was the simple realization of what a life she had been living. Life with neither mother to nurse her nor father to pamper her. Instead, she simply took cases and let that drive to assist fuel her like a well-oiled machine.

But there was no escape. Pain was pain. No amounts of being called a genius, no endless buckets of overflowing thanks could ever change that. To her, the man that made her was a coward, and her mother, a simple memory of a translucent floating head over a tidy, blue hospital bed now long-since burned into her mind, a motivation.

Even if she never knew her mother, she knew that she would want her to be the best she could be. Her mother would want her to be the nonpareil Kirigiri, so she didn’t just work for herself, and others, but the mother, who was simply just a memory, but a memory with a meaning, a memory with a feeling, a memory which a schoolgirl held onto tightly, and never wished to let go of.

In the coming years, Kyoko would become more widely known around the nation. Kyoko Kirigiri, a detective known for solving multiple homicide cases at the age of thirteen. She was the one putting criminals behind bars. She was the one letting the dead rest at peace as she placed life-robbers in a place where they could never see the sun that pushed her to wake in the morning for the rest of theirs.

She made headline after headline, and at the age of fifteen, she had solidified her purpose in life. She had grown to love this line of work. Even if she was prevented from acting it out, internally she was glad that she had helped all the people she did, saw their beaming faces. They were her light.

Every now and then, Kyoko would lay on her bed and talk, though not to her friends, but to her dear mother, eagerly speaking of the many adventures she had had, not letting the ethereal plane keep them apart. Even though she couldn’t physically see her, Kyoko swore at sometimes she could feel a presence, an aura, one of love, of tranquility, of kindness. Even though she couldn’t physically see her, Kyoko knew her mother was with her.

Life continued as normal; wake up, work, with the occasional school sessions, let her mother soothe her presence before bed, sleep, repeat. It was the life of a Kirigiri, and more and more people began to notice her as the genius she was—the most prodigal Kirigiri.

Especially when the letter came in.

It was a life-changing invitation—an invitation to attend Hope’s Peak Academy, a school for the rightfully named Ultimates, who were the best in their field at their age. Even the usually seemingly apathetic Kyoko couldn’t fight back the tears as she stared at the letter. She looked back to her grandfather, who was smiling weakly, but she knew, she was trained to have eyes that uncovered the hurtful truth, she could see it in his pale brown eyes, in his expression—it was a facade.

And she further understood when she tore open the letter with one vicious, animated rip, and read it, the wide smile on her face contorting into a melancholic frown, and the tears now had a completely new meaning as pained eyes gazed at the name of the headmaster.

‘Jin Kirigiri’, her own father.

She folded the letter and slowly placed it back into the destroyed envelope, gloved hands shaking. She quickly tossed it onto the desk and folded her arms angrily, turning in her black swivel chair with one quick flick of her barefoot.

“Should I go?” she asked, her voice much louder, more abrasive than usual, and her tone portraying the true vexation she had held for all this time.

To that, Fuhito, her grandfather, lacked an answer. Instead, he kept ghost-quiet. With no communication, the entire atmosphere in the room changed. No longer was this a happy occasion. The air was stagnant, and the tension was palpable. One Kirigiri waited for an answer, the other had no answer to give.

“You heard me,” the younger detective repeated. “Should I go?”

“You already know what my answer would be,” the more experienced Kirigiri told her. “You’re a woman now, you have to make your own choices.”

Kyoko sighed an enigmatic sigh. No one would be able to tell if she was angry, upset, happy, disappointed, or even a combination of all the aforementioned. She wasn’t even certain of that truth yet. 

Kyoko was much more of an enigma than she has first suspected. After each case she had worked, Kyoko thought that she became more and more in tune with herself, but she was never faced with this option. He was in her thoughts every so often, but to be presented with this choice, it was far more difficult than she had first suspected. 

Her suspicions were incorrect.

“I’ll be okay, Grandfather,” Kyoko reassured, the tears now halted, drying on her face and leaving a liquid stain of the night’s events. “I just need some time to myself.”

With a nod, Fuhito departed, not uttering another word to her, but with her muddled mind, Kyoko couldn’t decipher reality behind that. Maybe he was upset with her? Maybe he wanted clarity? She didn’t know. With him and things like this, she could never know.

She turned off the light that night, gazing into the beckoning darkness she had become so familiar with after working late nights and conversing with her mother when she returned home in preparation for her slumber.

“Mom, what should I do?” she asked aloud, hoping for an answer.

And, strangely enough, she received one. She just had a feeling in her stomach, a sudden out of the blue thought. Something told her that she should accept and meet the man who helped create her, no matter how much she despised him, no matter how much she loathed him, that she should grasp the opportunity.

“Thanks, Mom…” she whispered into the darkness, before finally succumbing to slumber, a smile on her face as she slept, confident in her mother’s decision.

After all, Kyoko thought her mother a genius.


End file.
